musings and stories by a wife, mom, teacher

Dinner Date

“Why don’t we do this more often? Why did it take so long for us to do this? How long has it been?”

Those were my wonderings after going out to dinner with my mom last night. Just me and my mom. No brother, no daughter, no husband – just me and my momma. It makes me sad to admit that I really can’t remember the last time her and I went out to dinner together. It’s probably been more than 7 years. Or the last time we actually spent time together without anyone else. We used to always go places or do things together. I do see her almost every day (we live down the street from each other). But seeing her and spending time with her are two very different things.

I knew my mom was having a tough week and she’s not one to blab about what’s bothering her. She tries to keep it all in, but she can’t hide it from me. I can always tell when something’s bothering her. I learned from the best – she was like a detective and always knew when something was eating at me (and still does). I wanted to make her feel better and get her to relax a little, but how? And this thought popped into my head – “maybe she just needs to go out, and have dinner and a drink.” I think she may have been shocked when I texted her about my idea because all she responded was”What about Emma?” You see, I wasn’t exaggerating, we literally don’t do anything alone. It’s usually me, Emma, and my mom – The Three Musketeers. I told her Emma was all taken care of and I’d see her later.

We went to our favorite place in our hometown. It’s one of those cozy, small restaurants/bars where the servers remember you and are happy to see you when you come in. For a second, I got a little bit nervous that it was going to be weird with just the two of us. And that lasted literally all of a second. We had a drink, we ate, we laughed, we chatted. Chatted about anything and everything (just not what was bothering her!). Just relaxing and enjoying each other’s company. It was in this moment that I realized I need to be better about making time for these dates with just her and I. Maybe I forget how important it is to make time for us because I see her everyday. But it’s not the same. We need to find time for just us. We need to do this more often. We can’t wait another 7 years. Sometimes we get so caught up in the daily routines of our lives that we forget about what is really important. Time flies by quickly, and we need to make time to enjoy life with the people we love.